Ravensbruck
by MoonLLotus
Summary: WWII fic.- I do not regret being who and what I am: A Gypsy. Being here will never change that.- REVAMPED


Title: **Ravensbruck**

Rating: M

Genre: Angst/ Drama

Disclaimer: I don't own SM

Thank you **xXxMayhemxXx** for being my beta

**WARNING**: this fic is an AU. It is about a WWII women's concentration camp, so if you are easily offended this is not the fic for you. Also, the characters names are from the American version of the anime, only because it sounded better that way.

* * *

ONE-SHOT

Serena's POV

* * *

I never had one home in Europe, but many. From Germany to France to Amsterdam to wherever else my family decided to go. We're gypsies you see. We travel all over nomadically, and never stay in one place for too long, otherwise we risk the chance of being arrested. My family is large. There's my father, mother, two older brothers, one older cousin, me, my three younger sisters and my niece from my eldest brother whose wife and him passed on from disease not too long ago. But that was before. Before everything went straight to hell.

* * *

My body shook violently as I tried to prevent myself from gagging at the smell of rotting corpses. One would think that I would be used to this by now. A German soldier looked over at me and I immediately told my body to stop its movement, if they were to think I was sick…then I would be one of those bodies.

I've been in this camp for a few years, since 1940, I can only wonder what year it is now. It surprises me that I'm not dead yet. Though every day I wonder when my time would come to die. I think that death would be better than this. Though I know that there are worst places then Ravensbruck, but I have never been to them. I wonder if there really is a greater being above us, if we all deserve this. The older women, when I first arrived here at the age of thirteen, said that the Lord was punishing us for our sins. I've never believed them.

I came to Ravensbruck with my mother, younger sisters, and my niece. Since then I haven't seen them. Ravensbruck is an all women's camp, no men allowed. I think that my little niece was killed, in one way I fear it, even though death is much better then living, I don't want her to die here. She deserves much better. However, I have yet to see her corpse as I dig. So there is still some hope that she is here, somewhere.

My father, brothers and cousin were taken somewhere else. To where, I have no idea. I do not know if they are still alive, if they managed to escape.

The real world seems like such a mystery to me now, I have no idea what's going on. From what I do remember, there is a war going on. And Hitler is a demon sent to Earth. More than once I resent the fact that my family decided to stay in Sweden longer than usual.

The soldier continued to watch me as I did my work. I looked down at my boney hands in disgust. Before I was shipped here, I used to be plump, a bit overweight, though I never looked it. I used to wish I were as skinny as the other girls, but now…I wish I were fat. Fat means food.

The girl next to me suddenly collapsed. But I chose to ignore her and continued working as a soldier came up to her and began to yell at her to get up, and get back to work. The soldier became a background noise and everything that she did to the girl do as well as I just continued to work. Women collapse all the time now, it's as if they're overworked animals and their only way of rest is to die.

Memories are what get me through day by day, but I can only wonder, when I get out (if ever) what memories would I have left to make? And with whom? I haven't seen any of my family since I was thirteen. So many years ago. There's always that wonderful dream that we'll all see each other at the end of this, if this ever does end, and there will be heartwarming reunions and we'll all be happy again and live our once nomadic, but loving, lifestyle. However I know that it is nothing but a bittersweet dream.

"You there!" a soldier yelled. This made me look up and get out of my dream. Only to see a female soldier come up to me.

"Yes?" I mumble, careful not to get her angry. She had the power to kill me, to beat me to death if she wanted. To take this pathetic life of mine away. As much as I speak of how death would be an escape, I do not want to die by the likes of her or any other Nazi.

Even though, according to regulations, a prisoner was not to be beaten except with a whip when punished. Often the director or doctor did this, the doctor would see that when the women fainted from pain, to check her pulse to see if she were still alive and then wake her up to continue her punishment. There was no reason for me to get a punishment, I have done nothing wrong. However severe beatings, whether injurious or life-threatening ones, were part of everyday life in this camp. Especially to those who were not entirely "normal" or the physically disabled.

A small bubble of fear arose inside of me, but I squished it before it evolved into something more.

"You're being reassigned," she sneered at me, as if I am something disgusting a person would accidently step in. "You're going to be put out to work in the fields."

* * *

The field work was the same work as before, I did nothing but dig. Everything was a blur, as it usually was. A blur of torture and pain. Of ignoring how tired your body was getting or how dizzy you were starting to feel. The new work gang I was with seemed nice enough, but what else were they supposed to be? We were all stuck in the same situation.

I didn't even realize when I was back in block 28. The only thing that made me realize was the foul smell, the hard thin mattress of straw underneath me, and the thin blanket that was supposed to create some sort of warmth.

* * *

We were forced to wake at five in the morning every day. From there we took roll calls and then had our coffee and bread.

Roll calls took place twice a day and lasted about two hours each time. If the number of people did not add up, the entire camp kept standing until the mistake was explained or until the escapee had been caught, if there had been an escape. Though that was unlikely. The logical excuse for why a woman did not show up was because she had died or committed suicide in the middle of the night.

I controlled my shivering as they continued to have us stand out in the cold with nothing for protection on except for a thin-stripped dress, wooden clogs, and white rags on our heads.

"When do you think they're going to be done with us?" I asked in a low voice to block 28's leader, a woman by the name Amara, who was in front of me.

She only shrugged, slightly so that the officers would not notice.

"Have patience Serena," the young woman next to me, Mina, said in just as low of a voice as I. She was faced forward, her mouth barely moved. She was a little bit older then I, though I'm not sure by how many years.

She had transferred from Auschwitz a few months prior, saying that this camp was much better than that one. When I had told I thought that was impossible she had given me this look with her dead eyes and said, "_Auschwitz is the gateway to Hell_."

I was about to say something to her but they dismissed us to eat before I even got to open my mouth. Though it wasn't so much eating as it was drinking cold, stale, coffee.

Many of the women that I know here think that it is just amazing that I still have enough spirit to be the way I am. That I have yet to be "broken" like most of them have. They seem to think that I have no fear. Not for the lynching of Gypsy women, or the constant harassment that the officers do. Perhaps though, I am just as broken as all of them are. I just show it a different way than them.

"Did you hear?" An older woman by the name of Trista came up to me, "They just opened the crematory. There will be no more burying of bodies, just burning." She tells me this in a hollow voice.

"What happens to the ashes?" I asked her.

She only shrugs before finishing her coffee and walking off in another direction.

* * *

I huff a bit while trying to shovel the snow off of the ground. Spring was going to be coming soon and it had been a horrible winter. Even the remnants of the said winter were horrible.

The sun was hiding behind the clouds, sending no warmth to us as we worked. It felt as if we were truly being punished by a higher being.

Why do they constantly have to be working us? What as the point? Why were we even in this camp to begin with? There was nothing wrong with us, we were all fine, healthy, women when we first arrived. There did not seem to be a point for us to be captured like animals and sent off to camps to work as if our lives had no meaning to them.

"Did you hear what they were doing to some women?"

I overheard one of the women, I think her name was Michelle, in our workgroup ask another. I quickly looked over to the officer that was supervising us then back to my work. Keeping my ears open.

"What?" Another, a woman named Raye, asked her. It amazes me that there was still some form of gossip here.

"Some Nazi doctors and scientists are using women for medical experiments. Horrible enough to kill," The other whimpered.

I shivered involuntarily, and not because of the wind this time. Experiments? How could someone do that to another person?

"What type of experiments?" another woman, Amy, asked, getting into the conversation.

Michelle continued to do her work, before finally answering, "They do different things. I saw this one girl with someone else's arm on her body. One of the doctors especially enjoys experimenting on twins. Identical twins the most."

Raye froze for a moment before noticing that the officer was watching her. She then went right back to work.

"How do you know all of this?" Amy asked.

"I had to bury the corpses before being transferred here." Michelle answered simply.

Raye finally looked up at the other two, her voice shaky, "I'm an identical twin. My sister is also here."

Amy and Michelle looked over at her, before Michelle said, "don't worry dear, I'll pray for you." And then they went back to work.

I merely sneered.

* * *

Children were something that was rare to see in Ravensbruck, just like men (with the exception of a few doctors of course). Most children were kept in a separate block that was far from the others. Closer to the newly build crematories.

So it was a small surprise to see a cart full of children being shipped off into a certain direction. I was on my way to receive my noon meal when the cart passed right by me.

"Serena! Serena!" a small voice cried from the cart. I doubt the child could see or tell who they were passing, but they kept screaming my name. "Serena! Serena!"

I stood frozen; it was then that I recognized that voice. It was my niece Rini. I watched her and the cart go towards the doctors building. It was also then that I wished that what the woman had said earlier wasn't true. However, deep down, I knew that I would never see Rini again.

I continued to go in the direction that I was headed, feeling nauseous and sick. Not wanting to believe what inside I already knew.

* * *

Mina came up to me before our second roll call; I briefly noticed how she was trying not to limp.

"What's wrong?" She asked. Her breathing was shallow, as if she had been running a marathon when really she only walked towards me.

I don't answer her and just stood in line waiting for the soldiers to be done with roll call. All I wanted to do was lie down on the hard straw mattress and think.

* * *

Trista came up to me again the next day, "the Nazi's are losing the war." She tells me before going off to get her own awful coffee. I can only blink before letting the news settle in.

The woman next to me, Lita, couldn't help the hopeful look that entered her expression.

Just because they were losing did not mean that we were going to be free any time soon. And if they _were_ truly losing, that doesn't mean that the tables may not turn.

* * *

Raye, the twin, was not there at workgroup today. I only got slightly suspicious. They say it is because she caught some disease from the rats, Lyme disease or something of the sort. I am not too sure about that. Perhaps I've become too paranoid over night. Perhaps when I saw my niece she was only going to visit the doctor, maybe she was sick. However, I do know better than this, I know the truth.

I don't know what Auschwitz is like, so I'm not sure if what Mina said about it is true, but I do know that this place is not Heaven.

I hold in coughing as I dig.

* * *

I lie down next to Mina, she was shivering again. The cold was getting to her, even though winter was coming to an end.

"Would you like my blanket?" I asked her. She merely shakes her head.

I would have liked to have met Mina before all of this; she has the face of a young woman who was once carefree, lively, loving and fun. I know that, but the way she is and how she has been, even though she'd been trying to hide it. She would not make it through the night. My only hope however is that the large, disgusting, rats do not get to her once she passes on. They preyed on a woman who was two bodies away from my own once, eating her eyes, nose and bottom lip. It was revolting.

"I do not regret being a Jew," Mina breathed.

The only thing I could to was nod.

"Goodnight Serena," she said, closing her eyes one last time. I will stay up the whole night to protect her.

I do not know when the war will end, when we will have our freedom, or if I will ever see my family again. Though I know this: I do not regret being who and what I am - A Gypsy. Being here will never change that.

* * *

FIN

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References:

**Lund University Library: "Voices from Ravensbruck"**  
http:/ www. Lub. Lu. Se/handskrift / projekt- ravensbruck/ interview420 -2. Html

**Lyme Disease and Animals  
**http:/ www. Cdc. Gov/ healthypets / disease / lyme. htm

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**MoonLLotus**: I wrote this fic over back in 11th grade year of high school and debated posting it up since then. It was originally written for my World History class, but after changing it around a bit I made it into a Sailor Moon fic.

I wrote this based off of the interviews I read from women actually in Ravensbruck. So everything in here was true. I'm not sure if this fic is controversial or not, I only hope that you as a reader understood my reason for writing this. It's easy to forget, but don't forget that things like this happen across the world, we are the future right? Please, work on preventing this from happening again.

Reviews are much welcome, flames, for once, are not. So please review, tell me what you think.

Originally Posted: 2/2/09  
Revamped: 4/18/12


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